Wait, what? You have to be trolling me. It is amazing what you guys to the south have to put up with.I have to constantly reassure myself that US politics is notoriously noisy and that "Americans will always do the right thing — after exhausting all the alternatives"

And, of course, the emergency ward trip costs the state at least an order of magnitude more than what it would cost to pay for minimal preventative care. This cost, by unicorns and magic pixie dust, is always considered not to exist by critics of publicly run healthcare. Just like the cost of bankruptcies due to the extreme inefficiencies of private sector health care, the number one cause of bankruptcies in the US, magically don't exist.

Everybody's required to have car insurance because society got sick of the carnage and massive property damage caused by uninsured drivers which used to be picked up by that good old sucker "The Taxpayer". I have yet to hear why that situation is different for healthcare or gun ownership.

Perhaps I should have written "American's will eventually do the right thing" to generalize even further without absolutes. Because nobody likes absolutes anyway.

In all seriousness, I genuinely hope that this is true. I believe that people are generally good but I despair at the destructiveness and harm that I see perpetrated on the american population by their government.

Yeah, it's much better to let your state's citizens suffer through more deficiencies of health care for another 10 years by not accepting free money on the off chance that it will cost more than free later?

I think that's the new health care plan from the GOP: Your illness and injury might go away in 10 years, so wait that long and then we'll treat it if it's still a problem. Oh, you died from that? Well, I guess we don't have to worry about paying to treat that symptom in 10 years! Sorry you weren't born into a wealthier family!

Folks here seem to think that in the US the government picks up the tab for uninsured ER patients. This is not the case. The cost is borne by the hospital and the physicians who wind up providing services for free. Basically these costs are then passed on to those with insurance, driving up the cost for everyone else.

How about, FUCK the concept of splitting health care among haves and have-nots in the first place - if the whole business wasn't a vile racket for a bunch of useless middlemen, there'd be plenty of care for everybody.

Why is it so unthinkable to try guaranteeing a certain minimum standard of living? I would way prefer to feel like I'm living in a civilised society than to actively create a permanent underclass; what's the fucking point of that anyway? Treat em mean to keep em keen, so shoes are shined cheap, guv'nor? WTF @ that Dickensian goddamn nightmare.

Dear US-ians, If it bothers you that you country doesn't have public health care, when the UK does, don't worry! The Conservative party is doing their best to privatise our NHS so it more closely resembles the US system.It makes sense if you're already using 1984 as a manual rather than a warning.

I have to constantly reassure myself that US politics is notoriously noisy and that "Americans will always do the right thing — after exhausting all the alternatives"

I think the most important thing to remember about US politics is that politicians still consider the policy of "mutually assured destruction" to have been a great success -- that is, they believe in risking utter destruction in order to win a minor tactical victory. With regard to US health care, I think they're quite happy to risk devastating epidemics or worse, to avoid any injury to the insurance industry.